Kyle Pfannenstiel is a reporter for the Idaho Capital Sun.
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Idaho Pastor Found Guilty of Trespassing in Protest of Anti-Trans Bills
Months after protestors wouldn’t leave the lobby of the Idaho governor’s office in an attempt to meet with him over anti-transgender bills, a jury on Tuesday found a local minister guilty on a misdemeanor trespassing charge.
The jury found the Rev. Sara LaWall—who wore a clerical collar under a rainbow speckled blazer as she sat in court—guilty of trespassing after prosecutors said she remained in the governor’s office after being warned it was closed for the night during a protest of anti-trans bills this spring.
After the jury delivered the verdict, LaWall, the minister for the Boise Unitarian Universalist Fellowship, told reporters that the possible prison sentence she could face would be less time than judges can dole out for violations of Idaho’s new criminal transgender bathroom ban.
“That just feels wholly unfair and outsized and ridiculous,” LaWall told reporters after her trial. “… The jury found me guilty of staying in the governor’s office after being told to leave. I didn’t dispute those facts. But someone going to the bathroom now has a higher sentence, and that just feels so disproportionate and so wrong.”